sdecoret - stock.adobe.comNewsSchwarz Group partners with Google on EU sovereign cloudPartnership with Europes biggest retailer will offer client-side encryption and ensure data doesnt leave GermanyByCliff Saran,Managing EditorPublished: 15 Nov 2024 11:45 Google has partnered with retail giant Schwarz Group to deliver what the pair claim is truly secure and sovereign cloud-based collaboration for German and European regulated industries.Through the partnership, Schwarz Groups StackIT, the cloud provider for the retailer, which operates as an independent company offering sovereign cloud capabilities, will provide client-side encryption of customers Google Workspace data.StackIT said customers data will remain resident within the European Union (EU), with full redundancy offered by backups hosted solely in its European datacentres to meet customer demands around data protection, data residency and data resiliency.Germany and the EU have until now lacked enterprise-grade cloud collaboration solutions that fully address the sovereignty requirements of regulated industries, including ensuring all data is secured and backed up on local soil with absolutely no opportunity for access by foreign nations or platform providers, said Rolf Schumann, co-CEO of Schwarz Digits, the IT and digital division of the Schwarz Group.Our partnership and new offering with Google Cloud will fill this gap with an entirely new business model.Client-side encryption means Google has no access to customers data. According to Schwarz and Google, this safeguards the sovereignty of not only Schwarz Group, but also all customers who value the independence of their operations, giving them full confidence that their data is always in their control.This new partnership will enable the companies of Schwarz Group to combine its leadership in digital transformation with Google Clouds strengths in productivity, collaboration and security, enabled by our cutting-edge AI, said Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet. Together, we are opening up a world of new, sovereign opportunities for European organisations to innovate and build on our joint solutions, accelerating a new era of innovation.Read more about data sovereigntyUK governments M365 use under scrutiny: Microsofts hold on government IT is under scrutiny, following a disclosure to a Scottish policing body that saw the software giant advise that it cannot guarantee data sovereignty in Microsoft 365.NHS data sovereignty: Amid security concerns and AI advances, a majority of the British public still trusts the NHS to store and analyse their health data, but would prefer it remains domiciled in the UK.Through the partnership, Google Clouds security will be integrated with those of XM Cyber, Schwarz Digits hybrid cloud security company. This integrated offering will then be distributed to customers via the Google Cloud Marketplace.According to Google and Schwartz, this integrated security will help German and European organisations, particularly those in highly regulated industries, raise the bar on their enterprise and multi-cloud security. In addition, XM Cybers Continuous Exposure Management will be embedded into the sovereign Google Workspace office productivity suite offered to European enterprises.This partnership changes the game for regulated industry players in Europe by removing the sovereignty and security concerns that often hold back more ambitious adoption of the cloud for productivity and collaboration, said Thomas Kurian, CEO of Google Cloud. Our alliance with companies of Schwarz Group will enable entire industries in Europe to deliver digital innovation with security and compliance at its core.Schwarz Group is Europes largest retailer, and the fourth-largest in the world. The company plans to transition its global office workforce to Google Workspace. The partnership with Google, according to Schwarz Group, enables critical workplace data to be protected against third-party access including foreign government institutions, and also transferred to alternate service providers if needed.Switching to Google Workspace is an important step for us out of legacy and into innovative, efficient and future-proof cloud-based collaboration, said Christian Mller, Co-CEO of Schwarz Digits. Google Workspace is the most secure and reliable productivity platform in the industry today, and we expect our organisation-wide migration to have significant flow-on benefits to all areas of operations from simplifying IT management to rendering our point-of-sale workflows significantly more efficient.In The Current Issue:Interview: Niall Robinson, head of product innovation, Met OfficeIAM: Enterprises face a long, hard road to improveDownload Current IssueDapr dresses up for CNCF project graduation + Diagrid delights Open Source InsiderPatent troll-busting: CNCF launches Cloud-Native Heroes Challenge CW Developer NetworkView All Blogs